In a reflection of growing anxiety in Europe over the use of Islamic symbols, a committee of Belgian lawmakers voted Wednesday to ban the wearing of burqas in public, paving the way for the first clampdown of its kind on the Continent. The proposal, which will be put to the full Parliament after the Easter break, highlights the political sensitivity of Islamic dress for European politicians grappling with the challenges of integrating its expanding Muslim population. It came in the midst of debates in France and the Netherlands over the wearing of head scarves or veils, and followed a referendum vote in Switzerland against building minarets.

While Saudi women might, just might, be escaping the vicious tentacles of religious police, Maldivian women are not far from being subject to a vagarious moral police force. In fact, women without burgas and long sheaths of black cloth are already looked down upon and unfairly viewed as loose women. Are we going backwards while our ‘role-model’ the nation that some of strive to recreate, is shifting gears?

The intersectionality of freedom of religion or belief and women’s rights is one of the most complex human rights issues faced by the world today. Down through the centuries, religious extremism and interpretation of holy books have shaped traditions and cultural stereotypes in a number of patriarchal societies. Some of these traditions and stereotypes have been detrimental to women, and have survived until the 3rd millennium. By Willy Fautré, Human Rights Without Frontiers.

A 16-YEAR-OLD girl is in shock after she was punched and beaten with a stick by her village headman for wearing a singlet and three-quarter pants. But police in the Northern Division yesterday backed the girl's right not be assaulted over the clothes she wore. The incident happened at midday yesterday at Naqai Village, about four kilometres outside Labasa. The police confirmed Asenaca Vunibola was leaving the village for town with her mother when the headman, Naisa Tagiwavoli, confronted her.

French authorities have denied citizenship to a man who forced his French wife to wear a face-covering veil, saying he had rejected national values of secularism and gender equality.

The government has been speaking out strongly against head-to-toe veils, and is moving toward banning them in public after a long public debate over French national identity in the age of globalization.

Sarkozy's veil climbdown: Has Nicolas Sarkozylost face in his battle against the burqa? One might think so considering his latest compromise on the issue. While the French president firmly believes that these allegedly Islamic veils are "a sign of subservience, a sign of debasement" which are "not welcome" anywhere in the Fifth Republic, he now thinks the only workable ban would be on public transport or in civic buildings.